Luke 8:15

‘And that in the good ground, these are such as in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, hold it fast, and bring forth fruit with patience.'

But the seed that fell on good ground represented those whose hearts were honest and open. They had a good, receptive heart. And once they received the word they held it fast, and they endured, and persevered, and patiently brought forth fruit.

So the emphasis of the parable is that the four types of ground represented four types of people. And it demonstrates that how they responded to the Good News of the Kingly Rule of God depended on the state of their hearts. The Kingly Rule of God was present among them all, but it had to be received by their putting their trust in the King and responding to and doing His words, by a faith which would result in fruit, and in the active doing of His will. Each must then choose how he would respond.

It will be noted that there was response in three out of the four examples. It was just that in one case the response was choked, and in another it simply petered out. Neither were true saving faith.

In its own quiet way it was a revolutionary concept of the Kingly Rule of God, not as something which had to be fought for, but as something that would come about through response to His word as the Holy Spirit applied it in the hearts of men.

(It will have been noted that Luke's account is briefer than Mark's and somewhat different. But this is to be expected. Luke did not just depend on Mark, even though he used him a great deal. He would also have gathered similar details from Aramaic speaking eyewitnesses, and possibly from Aramaic books about Jesus, as well as from the collection of sayings that Matthew also used (see Luke 1:1). Thus while he clearly took advantage of Mark's rendering, selecting from it what he found suitable, at the same time he would also extract from elsewhere, and also do a little translating himself in a form more useful for his Gentile readers. The parable of the sower was no doubt repeated any number of times in different forms and with different emphases and he would thus have a number of alternatives to choose from).